by Nicole Ellis
I stared at her. She was crazier than I’d thought. “You put my dog in danger for that? Were you behind all the other acts of vandalism?”
“I can’t confirm that,” she said smugly. “But let’s just say that other than you being here, my plan is going quite well. And if you try to say I put your dog up there, I’ll deny it. It’s your word against mine.”
“Did you kill Jed?”
“What? Why would you think that?” She shot me a wounded look. “I may have wanted the resort to fail, but what reason would I have to kill Del’s cousin? He was devastated by Jed’s death.”
“So you didn’t kill him?”
“No, of course not.” She looked miffed. “I was visiting my family in Spokane the day he was killed. You can call them and confirm.”
I’d hoped the murderer had been caught, but unfortunately, I thought she was telling me the truth.
She saw the thin rope hanging next to the loft. “Ah, that’s how you got up there.” She pulled on the end of it, looping it over the edge of a hook on the wall. “That should keep you away for a while longer.”
She waved at me, grinning maniacally. “See you later.”
When she was gone, Desi appeared in the barn. “I heard what Sela said—she’s even battier than we thought.” She stared up at me. “Now, how are we going to get you and Goldie down from there?”
I pointed at the rope. The frayed fibers were even more evident from this height. “I think if you pull on that hard enough, it will break at the top. It’s barely hanging on by a thread.”
She yanked on it, and it tumbled down, spiraling in the air like a snake as it fell. “Now what?”
“I can probably tie it onto something up here to get down, but let’s get Goldie down first.” I released the chain from his collar. “He’s a smart dog, but I don’t think he can climb down a rope. We’ve got to find something to use as a harness lift.”
She snapped her fingers. “The tarp outside, on the hood of the truck. We can loop the rope through the holes in it and make a sack for Goldie.”
“Good idea.” Goldie and I walked over to the window, peering down as Desi maneuvered the tarp off the truck.
I lowered the rope down and Desi wove it through the holes, then through the loose end of the rope up to me. I caught it and pulled up the harness. I placed Goldie in the tarp and put the whole thing on the wide window ledge. He whimpered.
“It’s ok, boy.” I patted his head. “Stay.”
I wrapped the rope around a post and tied the other end around my waist before gently pushing the bundle over the edge. I made a mental note to thank my dad for the hours he’d spent teaching me knot-tying techniques when I was a kid. The rope slid along the post, then caught as my body weight slowed Goldie’s descent before Desi could help guide him down. Then, I pulled it back up, tied the rope to the beam, and rappelled down the side.
Desi’s eyes widened. “Wow, I didn’t know you knew how to do that.”
“Adam and I took rock climbing lessons before the kids were born.”
“Ah. One of those things that childless people get to do on dates.”
“Yep.” Still on the cab of the truck, I leaned down to hug Goldie, who was wriggling around. He returned the gesture of love by licking my face. “Well I’m ready to get out of here.”
Desi didn’t hear me—the front of the truck had drawn her attention. “Uh, Jill?”
“What?” I followed her gaze. The truck’s front end had been smashed in so much that I wondered how Tyler had driven it back here.
“Didn’t the saleswoman at the jewelry store say that the robber smashed down the back wall with a truck?” She pointed at the damage. “That could certainly be the result of running into a concrete block wall.”
A sinking feeling hit my stomach. “Do you remember what she said about the back workroom being recently remodeled?”
“Tyler’s a carpenter.”
“Uh huh.”
We both stared at the barn. I didn’t know why we hadn’t put it together sooner. Tyler and Jed had been friends, so it made sense that if Jed had robbed the store, Tyler might have been his accomplice. And if Tyler knew Jed had the diamonds …
“Desi, we’ve got to get out of here.”
Her face turned white and she nodded.
We scrambled down onto the truck bed, Goldie jumping down next to us.
“What are you doing here?” Tyler’s voice was unyielding.
18
I inadvertently looked at the front of the truck.
“Yeah, I heard you and your friend talking,” Tyler said.
Desi’s eyes bugged out and my stomach lurched. Goldie barked loudly.
“Keep your dog quiet,” Tyler ordered.
I held Goldie close to calm him down and we tried to edge our way back in the truck bed.
He regarded us with shrewd eyes, as if deciding what to do about us.
I pointed to the newer truck parked near the house. Tyler’s dog had jumped into the back, and I could see suitcases stacked inside the truck bed.
“It looks like you’re going somewhere. Just let us go. We won’t say anything until you’re far out of town.”
He grinned at us. “No, you’re not going to say anything—because you won’t be alive to do so.”
He pulled a gun on us and ordered us down from the truck, then herded us toward the front of the barn.
“Why did you kill Jed? To get the diamonds?”
“Of course. I had to kill him. That idiot wouldn’t have lasted a week with them before telling someone about the robbery. But then I couldn’t find his share of the diamonds. Got them now though. He’d hidden them in an Arizona Diamondbacks ball cap in his room.” He dug into his pocket then held his palm out, revealing a handful of loose diamonds.
My eyes widened. He had hundreds of thousands of dollars of precious gems in his pocket. As a mom, I couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if he had a hole in his pocket. Unfortunately, I didn’t have much of a chance to think about it.
“In here,” Tyler said, nudging me in the back with the gun. The double barn doors were still open, and he pushed Desi, Goldie, and me into his workshop. He shut the doors behind him, then, with his gun still trained on us, rummaged around in the cabinets with one arm.
When he turned back around to face us, he held lengths of twine. I could hear Desi breathing quickly next to me and Goldie poising himself to pounce on Tyler. If he did, I’m sure Tyler would have shot him, so I patted Goldie’s head to relax him.
“What are you going to do to us?” I asked.
“What does it look like, princess? I’m going to tie you up, set this barn on fire, and then hightail it out of town. I’ll be halfway to Mexico before they find you in the smoldering rubble.”
I flashed back to the condo in Ericksville that had been torched by an arsonist. I’d seen it before the fire crew was able to extinguish all of the flames. The fire had spread terrifyingly fast.
He sat us on the ground next to a support pole and tied Desi and me back-to-back against the pole. To keep Goldie in place, he tied a length of rope to his collar.
Tyler stepped back, admiring his handiwork. “That should do it.” He brushed his hands off and threw the remaining rope in a corner.
I twisted my hands, but the ropes were tight. Unless Desi had something sharp hidden in her clothes, we were out of luck.
He tore open an emergency supply kit and removed two small votive candles. “This should do it. By the time these catch everything on fire, I’ll be safely out of the area.”
Desi and I watched as he lit them then threw them up into the loft. At the rate they were burning, I estimated it would only be ten minutes max before the flames reached us. With the large quantities of paint and wood stain lined up against the walls, we wouldn’t survive long before the whole place went up in flames.
Tyler stared at us. “Did you ladies have purses? I don’t want to leave any loose ends.”
I n
udged Desi’s hand with mine. The faster he left the barn, the more time we had to escape.
“I left a beach bag back in the truck,” Desi volunteered.
He turned and left, slamming the doors shut with a bang, then sliding the wooden bar into place to lock us in.
As soon as he was out of sight, we struggled against our bonds.
“I can’t get this thing loose,” Desi said.
The twine cut into my wrists, but I continued to try to work my way out of them. Next to me, Goldie contorted himself trying to gnaw at the makeshift harness.
The wisps of smoke coming from the loft entranced both Desi and me.
“We’re not going to be able to get out.” Her face had turned white and her voice held acceptance of our fate. Outside, something crashed against the side of the barn, adding to the fear we felt inside the structure.
“No!” I said. “We’ve got to figure this out. Let me see if I can work on getting yours loose.” I stretched my fingers as far out as they would go, but only succeeded in briefly looping them under the rope around her wrists. She moved an inch closer and I rubbed the twine against a screw that was sticking out of the bottom of the pole.
“What was that?” Desi twisted her head around toward the back of the barn.
“Huh? What do you mean?” The screw cut through a section of the coarse rope.
“I thought I saw someone in the window.”
“Adam? Tomàs?” My spirits lifted.
She shook her head. “No. Someone much shorter.” She moved her hands and the remaining strands of rope popped loose. “Hey, I’m free.” She stretched out along the floor and managed to open a cabinet against the wall. “Bingo,” she said, holding up a file saw.
Using the file, Desi made short work of the ropes holding us to the support pole. We ran to the door and banged on it, but the slide bolt held. The only other exits were the window in the back of the barn that only a child could fit through and the window in the loft. Unfortunately, as we’d determined before, there was no way up to the loft from the inside. That didn’t really matter, because it was quickly being engulfed by fire. We were stuck.
“Maybe whoever was out there will hear us,” Desi said.
“Help us!” we shouted.
“Hold on,” a voice came from the other side of the door. “This thing is stuck.” The door shook from the exterior, but it didn’t open.
Burning embers crashed down from the loft, sending flames that crept closer and closer to where we stood. Goldie barked loudly at the approaching fire. Smoke filled the air and we lowered ourselves to the ground to decrease our exposure.
“Please hurry,” I cried out.
With a crack, the bolt slid open and the doors were flung open. Coughing, the three of us spilled out onto the dirt outside, then crawled a few feet away.
“Are you ok?” a woman asked.
I rubbed my eyes to make sure I wasn’t seeing something that wasn’t there. “Sela?”
She nodded. “I came back to check on you. I think I may have gone too far with taking your dog.”
“Ya think?” Desi asked.
I elbowed her. “Well, thank you for rescuing us.” My eyes darted around. “Tyler locked us in there and set it on fire. Have you seen him?”
Plumes of smoke were rising from the top of the barn.
“We need to get further away,” Desi said.
“Yeah, I saw Tyler.” Sela grinned. “Come here.”
We skirted the barn, giving it a wide berth. Near Tyler’s truck, a body lay on the ground in a crumpled heap.
“What happened?” I asked.
She reached down near the rear right tire and held up a can of spray sunscreen. “I found this in that bag over there when it was still by the old truck.” She pointed at Desi’s beach bag, lying in the dirt near Tyler. “I heard him threatening you, and when he came back to his truck after grabbing the bag, I jumped out and sprayed him in the face. While he was distracted, I hit him with a tire iron he’d left in a heap in the dirt. Then I tied him up. All that junk he has lying around really came in handy.”
“Whoa,” Desi said. “That took some guts.”
“Yeah.” Maybe I’d misjudged Sela. I glanced down at Goldie. Nope, even if she’d saved us, she’d still stolen my dog and put us in this position in the first place.
Sirens pierced the air and the fire truck from the celebration, still decorated in festive blue and yellow ribbons, roared up to the barn. Three firefighters jumped out and quickly trained a hose on the building. A police car followed close behind them.
“And that’s my signal to leave.” Sela hurried down the path toward the resort.
The police officer got out of his patrol car, quickening his pace when he saw Tyler bound on the ground.
He made his way over to us at the edge of the clearing. “What happened here?”
Desi and I looked at each other.
“It’s a long story,” she said.
I nodded. “That man over there locked us in the barn and set it on fire.”
He looked over to the burning barn and then back to us. His eyes widened. “He tried to kill you?”
“Yes,” we said in unison.
He called for backup and went over to Tyler, adding more secure zip ties to his hands. Tyler still hadn’t woken up after Sela had hit him on the head with a tire iron.
“So who hit him?” the policeman asked.
“It was a woman named Sela. She works over at the Thunder Lake Resort.”
He scanned the clearing. “So where is she now?”
Desi shrugged. “We don’t know. She went back there after she got us out of the barn.”
I don’t think either of us wanted to throw Sela under the bus for her crimes. She could have been killed saving us from Tyler, but she hadn’t run away when she saw we were in danger. I’d talk to Leah afterward and find out if she still wanted to press charges against Sela. Outing her as the camp vandal didn’t seem like a decision that should be up to Desi and me.
“Check his pockets,” I said. “He had the stolen diamonds in there.”
The policeman’s eyebrows shot up and he pointed at Tyler. “He’s the jewelry store robber?”
“Yes. And he killed Jed. They robbed the store together, but he double-crossed Jed.” The adrenaline had worn off and I felt drained.
“He told you that?” he asked.
Desi nodded. “He told us everything before he tried to kill us.” She glared at Tyler.
The officer made a few more notes on his pad before his backup arrived. Tyler moved a little, groaning as he stretched. He sat up awkwardly with his hands and feet tied. The policeman went over to him and read him his rights. Another two police cars showed up and two of the officers helped carry Tyler over to the back of a patrol car.
After another officer interviewed us for about twenty minutes, we were given the go-ahead to head back to the resort.
“Do you think anyone noticed we were gone?” I glanced at my watch. About two hours had passed. “You’d think they would have at least noticed I wasn’t there to present the medal to the winner of the boat race.”
Desi snorted. “I certainly hope so. We were only supposed to be gone for half an hour.”
We stopped by our cabins on the way back and found our family gathered on the grassy lawn behind them. The boys were playing with a ball, but the adults were pacing back and forth.
“Jill,” Adam called out, running to me. “Where were you?”
Desi hugged Tomàs and he peered at her. “What happened to the two of you?”
I took a deep breath. “Someone stole Goldie and someone else locked us in a barn and set it on fire.” I leaned down to pet Goldie and settle my nerves a bit.
“What?” Tomàs yelped.
Adam’s eyes bugged out. “Who tried to kill you?”
“Tyler—he lives on the property next door.” Desi picked up Lina, who was asleep on a blanket nearby.
“Apparently, he and Jed h
ad robbed the jewelry store and he’d killed Jed to get his share of the diamonds.” I leaned against Adam, grateful for his presence.
“And you two just happened to figure that out?” Tomàs narrowed his eyes at Desi.
“No, no. We weren’t snooping there this time, I promise.” Desi looked straight into her husband’s eyes. “We were only there to rescue Goldie, and we got caught up in the mess.”
“Well, who dognapped Goldie?” Adam asked.
“Sela.” I scanned what I could see of the resort but wasn’t surprised not to see her around. If she was smart, she’d be taking Tyler’s route toward Mexico at this point.
“The hiking guide?” Tomàs asked.
“Yep.” Desi nodded. “She was the one who was creating all the trouble at the resort like setting the boats loose. She wanted Del and Leah to sell so she could have Del to herself.” She shook her head. “She was a little wacko, but she did save us from the burning barn.”
“I can’t believe it.” Adam hugged me harder. “It wasn’t until you’d been gone for an hour that we really started to get worried. But we didn’t want to raise too much of a fuss because of the festivities. We were about to send out a search party when the fire trucks left to respond to the fire next door.
“Are you sure you weren’t snooping?” Tomàs asked.
“Nope, Scout’s honor.” I grinned at him. It wasn’t often that I could say Desi and I were completely innocent. Well, at least mostly innocent.
“Why are you so happy?” Adam asked.
“We’re alive and together in this beautiful place.” I spread my arms out, joy spreading through me as I realized it was true. Desi and I had been in danger, but we were fine now and I didn’t want to waste any more of the precious time we had with our families.
Desi laughed. “She’s right. Let’s get back to the festivities.”
Tomàs and Adam gave us dubious looks but gathered up the kids and we went down to the lake where they were now having swimming races.
19
Later that night, Desi and I met with Del and Leah in the deserted café to tell them about what had transpired earlier in the day. Del was there before Leah, and I decided to ask him why Tyler had told me that Del was hiding something.